A covert U.S. operation slowly spins out of control
The rumors are everywhere: a whisper in a café here, a banner headline in a newspaper there. Throughout Nicaragua and Honduras, there is fearful talk of a war breaking out between the two neighbors. In Nicaragua, the Sandinista government has declared five provinces bordering Honduras "military emergency zones." The regime is advising citizens to stockpile rice and other foods, while the papers in the Nicaraguan capital of Managua are filled with stories about alleged CIA plots. In Honduras, airfields are being built close to the border and soldiers gather in bars in the capital city of Tegucigalpa to talk strategy. The mood was perhaps best captured by a priest during Mass at the Church of St. Nicholas of Tolentino in Managua. "Please, God," he intoned, "do not let an invasion happen."
Nicaragua's war jitters are being fueled by the country's increasingly edgy, leftist Sandinista regime. Managua, however, has received a boost from a U.S. covert operation that began modestly enough as an effort to cut off the arms flowing through Nicaragua to leftist guerrillas in El Salvador, but that now appears to have grown into an attempt to topple the Sandinista government. As a result, the border between Honduras and Nicaragua has suddenly become a tinderbox where a few skirmishes could easily erupt into a full-scale shooting war. Even if war does not break out, critics contend, not only have the U.S. activities strengthened the resolve of the Sandinistas in Managua but the operations now threaten to destabilize Honduras itself.
Though the Sandinistas overthrew Dictator Anastasio Somoza Debayle and seized control of Nicaragua in July 1979, it was not until Ronald Reagan took office in January 1981 that relations between the two countries seriously deteriorated. The Administration began charging that the Sandinistas, backed by Cuba and the Soviet Union, were funneling arms to leftist guerrillas in El Salvador, often shipping the weapons across the southern heel of Honduras. In December 1981, Reagan gave the go-ahead for a series of covert operations to snip the supply line and intimidate the Sandinistas. Included were financial aid for opposition groups within Nicaragua and military assistance to the various contras (counterrevolutionaries) who conduct raids into Nicaragua from bases in Honduras. For a "covert" operation, the U.S. effort was curiously, perhaps deliberately, open. News of Reagan's decision began to leak out in Washington last March. In Honduras, the American agents were easily spotted because of their jeans, plaid shirts and short haircuts.